Oops! Somehow May and (nearly) half of June managed to slip by without writing a single blog entry. How did that happen? I wish I could say that I’ve been so wrapped up in fulfilling orders that I haven’t had a spare moment to sit down and write. Unfortunately that hasn’t exactly been the case.
Instead of lovingly crafting entertaining blog entries, I’ve been busy making other stuff. I know, I know… I should have been telling you dear readers about it, but I’ve just been enjoying the creative process and leaving it at that. In the past few weeks I’ve made a dress, several charcoal drawings, a number of designs for my portfolio, and cooked some lovely food. When inspiration hits, you have to just let it happen.
I also visited the Dutchman-at-large in Amsterdam and have to admit that the city is slowly starting to grow on me. Once you get over the notion that a couple of hours of direct sunlight is considered a “sunny day”, it’s actually a lovely place to be. On this visit, I braved the city’s bike paths and pedaled amongst the well seasoned Dutch cyclists. Our cycling tour took us past the prison, a nifty housing complex built entirely out of shipping containers, and the headquarters of the local Hell’s Angels. There’s something quite humbling about cautiously huffing and puffing along with a white knuckle grip on the handlebars only to be swiftly and noiselessly overtaken by a mother pedaling a bike outfitted to accommodate two children and several bags of groceries.
A quick overnight trip to Boston also yielded some exciting fashion finds. I was looking for something to wear to a wedding, and my first find was an off-white Badgley Mischka shift dress, which begged the question: Is it ok for guests to wear white dresses to weddings these days? This sparked a bit of a debate amongst the salesclerks and patrons (in case you were wondering, the answer was 50% ‘yes’, 30% ‘no’, and 20% ‘I don’t know’). I also found something that I’d been hoping to find for years: a vintage Diane Von Furstenberg wrap dress with a splashy purple and blue print. I ended up wearing the wrap dress to the wedding.
In business news, I’ve been working on selling and marketing the current collection and reevaluating the brand’s future and positioning. This led us to lower some of the prices a bit and to consider developing alternative sales agreements for some shops. I’m also looking into taking on another line to design for here in the studio at which point I will relinquish my control of sales and marketing and place this task into more capable hands. Just an idea at this point. I’ve sent out a few proposals to clients looking to outsource their design. We’ll see what happens.
Oh! And I’m helping my brother to prepare for a cook-off. I’m pretty excited about this. I haven’t heard all the details, but the challenge is to prepare a Mediterranean meal of some sort. Hopefully I can persuade him to do an Italian menu. We’re planning a trial run/brainstorming session for next week and I’m sensing some homemade Orechiette al cime di rapa in my future…
